Why do made guys have to be 100% Italian?

It's a silly rule that serves no practical purpose.

Think about it....the Russian OC groups have guys from mixed ethnic backgrounds and the Russian OC groups are a lot more successful than Cosa Nostra.

Look at Joe Watts who had a Welsh father and a Italian mother and he could have easily have been a Gambino capo had he been made. Watts bought in tons of money for the Gambinos but because his father was Welsh suddenly he is unworthy.

Stupid.

Yeah but by mostly (not always in the US) sticking to their own, the Italian Mafia is one of the oldest organized crime groups in the world, by still being present for almost two centuries

The mafia was never inclusive,until the commission creation in 1931 the sicilians doesn't want the other italians like the neapolitans or calabrians in their gangs.Until the 1970s/1980s there was the little italies in the cities so was easy to by full blooded italian and boss like patriarca sr never made a wiseguy that wasn't full blooded.In the 1980s with the mafia crisis this rule was deleted and chucky porter was made even if he was italian only on the mother side.
Massino said that in the 2000 in the last commission meeting the rule was restored.
Personally I think that these days it's enough to have an Italian surname and made many $$$ to be made.About Joe Watts this is a different things because even he was a shell of what was,the american mafia is still italian so can made a guy (in the east coast families) with a not-italian surname.The outfit give to not-italian associates the same respect that give to made men so even not made their are at the same level.I think that this will be the future of LCN.

Actually by sticking to their own, that has helped contribute to their demise. Once there was 25 families in the US but now there are only 9. Less full blooded Italians around and the ones that are around don't want to join the mob.

The Chicago OutFit allows non Italians to be made and they aren't doing any worse than the Cosa Nostra families. It shows that the full blooded Italians only rule is pointless and contributing to their demise.

The Chicago Outfit don't allows non italians to be made,but made them to the same level of the made men in fact the Outfit core group is amde of 28 made men but with the associate they are around 100.

I've always seen the mob ( Made guys..) as a mechanism to privatize illegal criminal markets and contacts.

@ Furio

You should read some of John Dickes works. TheSicilian mafia has ALWAYS initiated just about any Italian they can get money with. Can't beat em, join em type of thing. There were a few powerful Mafiosi not Sicilian initiated into the SICILIAN Costa Nostra.

Examples?
1. Michele Zaza
2. Antonio Bardellino
3. Lorenzo Nuvoletta
4. One or more of those Piromallis, ,maybe Mommo, I gotta get my book....
There could

Like take Zaza, right? He was the biggest player in the cigarette trade, which centered around Naples. It was the biggest illegal business in Italy. So what did Costa Nostra do? They initiated men with influence in the industry, so as to gurrantee their stake, and to privatize the control of the markets in THIER hands. (But Zaza was STILL virtually uncontrollable, lol)

This was one of Luciano's main issues. It's why I think he and his click were so tight with Chicago. They cared about who was CAPABLE, first, ethnicity second, if they really cared at all.

if they start to make non italians it would be not cosa nostra anymore, but another organization that has nothing to do with it
one thing is make calabrians and neapolitans, who are like the sicilians with the same mentality, but not foreigners
i don't think anyway russian oc is more succesfull than cosa nostra, in the states cosa nostra is till stronger than russian oc, although by far weaker than the past

Joe Watts didnt have any italian in him at all and Gotti even said to him if he had even a little italian blood he would have been made.

CabriniGreen Im referring to american mafia not sicilian. Lorenzo Nuvoletta was called "the mafioso from Marano" and was the only man that the sicilian mafia respect in Campania. In 1981 Nuvoletta tried to stop the Nco-NF war and asked cosa nostra leaders to partecipate the meeting.
What interested to Luciano is to made $$$ and don't matter if Vito Genovese was Neapolitan,costello was calabrian ecc the Outfit was an exception for many years they doesn't had a formal induction ceremony just a sit in were the old men say ok youre in, to the mobster.

It’s all about family. If you’re not full blooded Italian, then it’s not Cosa Nostra.

Please bear in mind that any organized group or street gang is by nature territorial. It could originate in a small village in Italy or a small city block in south Boston of Irish decent. It could consist of family members, ethnicity or friends. Usually it forms in impoverished areas. It's success can depends on many factors such as numbers, street smarts, power,ability to expand and other. The groups or gangs that are most likely to succeed are the ones that abide by their criminal code.
The Mafia being one of the oldest criminal group has proven itself time after time to be resilient & strict adherence to it's code. In Italy they do not have a recruiting problem,so naturally they will be more discriminate and will recruit usually from territories they control or originate from and family members. So in Italy, just being Italian does not guarantee you membership. Let's forward to the Mafia in the USA. In the earlier days with a large influx of Italian coming into the country there was no problem with recruiting Italians that originate from their hometown (Sicily) or southern Italy.
Accepting members based on origin is a practice that most criminal groups around the world follow. Are there exceptions ? Yes there are. Even though a non Italian is not a member, he can still be an important associate within the mafia organization. Especially, if they are good earners.
So I do not buy this idea that non Italians are not accepted into the mafia organization. Example,Mayer Lansky couldn't care less that he couldn't be a boss in the mafia, his standing in the Mafia organization as an associate gave him more power & money than most that were members.

Luciano agreed to the rule to appease the Sicilian hard liners. The wars probably would have continued if he hadn't. One of the reasons Bonanno tried to start on upheaval is because too many non Sicilian and Jews had equal or more clout than him. And, look how fast he was banished.

It hasn't been Cosa Nostra for over 100 years. They were not a criminal organization when they started out, in fact they were the good guys.

The Russians are worldwide and are involved in more rackets and scams than Cosa Nostra. They own banks, politicians and numerous legitimate businesses. In the big trades like drug trafficking and arms trafficking, Cosa Nostra can never compete with the Russians.

Sammy said his mother was Italian.

It's all about money and Cosa Nostra has drifted very far from what purpose it was created. When Cosa Nostra started in the US they were the opposite of what Cosa Nostra was all about. They were extorting their own people.

I know the Russian mafia to be a powerful organization but not to the point you make them out to be. The Cosa Nostra operates in different countries the Calabrians are worldwide and are into drugs and arms trafficking and have politicians under their belt as well but yet more frequently than none you here Italian mafia's arrests. When do you hear of Russians getting arrested for trafficking. Certainly not as often. This tells me that the frequency of trafficking by Russians is not as prevalent.

He's just some Russian fan boy. It really makes me laugh when these random kids go around on the internet, blabbering on how the Russians are the toughest and most feared and biggest and blah blah blah. Like you said ciment, there is no proof to show the Russians are so powerful. Sure they may be very powerful in Russia, but so are the Italians in Italy, the mexicans in Mexico, triads in China, and so on so forth, so a point can't be made there, you have to look outside the country of origin. Outside of Russia, the Russians may have some power in eastern Europe, and a few guys scattered here and there in spain and some other countries but not nearly to the extent of the Italians. You got huge families in Canada, clans in germany, Belgium, the Netherlands, Australia, Venezuela, other parts of South America and of course the United States where they continue to make headlines year after year. Where are the Russians? And don't give the Bs excuse that they are so secretive they can't ever get caught, because that's bullshit. They are just small and low-key so nobody in law enforcement really gives a shit about them. There's no heirarchies or anything I can really find anywhere for Russian groups in Canada or the US. What do the Russians have in the us? A few gavone's in Brighton Beach, and some outposts in Florida and LA. You can't even begin to compare that to the lcn, even it's weakened state today, that still has thousands of guys. The five families still dominate organized crime in New York City, the largest and arguably most important city in the us, and I would also say they are still the most important players throughout the whole east coast, chicago and detroit. (And arguably some other cities too). So I would definitely say the Russians are second tier to the Italians. The only reason people make them out to be big are because they aren't Italian and just want to bust the Italians balls. The same argument can be made for the other oc groups. Sure they are powerful in their home countries, but worldwide they aren't nothing like the Italians. And you gotta remember, countries like Mexico and China are less developed and more corrupt than Italy in the present day, so it's easier to do crime in these places.

cosa nostra started as a criminal organization since the beginning, i mean in sicily
i was talking of the united states anyway, cosa nostra is stronger than russian oc over there
a better comparison would be between italian oc as a whole (sicilian mafia/ndrangheta/camorra/scu) and russian oc as a whole (russian/georgian/ukrainian etc.)

The Calabrians are 'Ndrangheta not Cosa Nostra.

The Russians don't get arrested for trafficking because they got politicians and Police protecting them.

The FBI said it themselves that they target the Russians in the US more than the Cosa Nostra families because the Russians are a bigger threat.

Cosa Nostra never started as a criminal organization in Sicily.

Russian OC wins against the Italian OC. Much more money.

yes, it started as a criminal group at the beginning of 1800s and it copied ranks and rituals from the freemasons, at least this is the most believable theory so far



according to who? italian mafia seems to be more widepsread worldwide and more involved in international drug trafficking
both have strong political links and largely involved in frauds and money laundering in their countries

That's ridiculous and completely unfounded. The FBI love to publicly announced and brag when they bust organized crime rings, plus it makes the public know they are "doing something useful". I rarely if ever see them busting Russians, maybe one relatively smaller bust every few years, not even. Meanwhile there are multiple la Cosa nostra busts a year, a few small ones and usually one bigger one. And the lcn is a low key organization these days. If there were Russian mob busts in the us, people would likely be posting about them on this site, but there aren't because the Russian mob in the US mostly exists in the imagination of kids who don't know any better. Please stop trying to blow up these gavone's to be much bigger than what they really are, Russian OC in the United States is not that much.

Easy on the vodka ! So you say Russians don't get arrested. In a previous post you said they are worldwide. Are we to conclude from your intellectual analysis,that the police & politicians worldwide will not arrest Russian mafia members because they are on the Russian mafia payroll.

Furio,

Then who made Frank Salemme? His mom was Irish, and theres been different documents saying " Patriarca couldn't make him because his mother was Irish."

Yet he was considered the boss of New England at one point?

Later on even Salemme's son was made, who only was a quarter Italian..

Right but was Frank Sr made? And if not, how was he considered to be the boss?????

With the law and lnc not changing with the time being full blood this day n age make no sense.

Does this "only Italians" thing stop rats? No fucking way.

I think thay nowadays the lcn have to start recruit more and more half italians too
Because if not in 30 years from now their be no mafia anymore due to less full italians

Matthey Madonna was involved in a gambling scheme on 2007 where they made 2.2 billion dollars in 15 months.. Thats still going strong in my opinion.


The Italian mafia overall including allt the four are more powerful than the Russians. You have Russians who is considered in media as a Mafia or as a Gangster but the truth is he is just a buisness man who uses criminal methods to run his buisness, but he is not devoted 100 percent to that life like a ndranghetisti or a Camorristi.

Hey Furio, if you had t guess, how often is Omerta broken in Italy?

In USA in the 1950's basically never. In 2018, it seems like 50%

How are things over there?

They didn't make 2.2 billion dollars. That is the total number of bets in revenue.

Well maybe of all those bets they lost 10 % However you wanna put it and calculate it atleast 1 billion dollar has gone into their pockets.

That would be an incredible feat! Their goal to not be the gambler and take basically the same amount of action on both sides of bet and live off the vig.

So thy would be lucky to clear 10% if no one messed up .... maybe 15% if they messed up and got lucky but after expenses it's probably more like 8%.

But close to $2M In 15 months .... not bad!

Hmmmm you clearly don't have any knowledge on how bookmaking works. Bookies take bets, that money doesn't belong to them and most of it ends up in the pockets of the lucky winners who made the winning bets.

Depend by the organization: the camorra clans are plenty of rats,in the sicilian mafia the peak of mafiosi that flipped was between 1987 (the maxi trial) and the 1993,the last great mafioso to broke the omertà was Gaspare Spatuzza in 2008;the ndrangheta rats can be counted on the finger of one hand and no big fishes.

The Camorra have plenty of rats ?!?! Really ?!
In gomorra it's seem like they are all stand up guys (i know it's a tv show but still)

8% of $2.2 billion is $176 million.

Or recruit more immigrants from the Mezzogiorno.

Furio's assessment of the three Mafia's is correct.
The ones that are more successful are the ones that enlist family members and expand their network by having their children marry into other established families. Usually the more male sons you have the greater the influence. Their children are taught at an early age and their wives being born in that environment also play an important role in raising these children to become men of honor. It is a way of life and culture that is passed on from generations to others.
Being 50% or 100% Italian is not the only criteria. The ones that circumvent are the ones that pay the price when arrests are made and some decide to rat.

Meyer gomorrah is real as the godfather; in the real life ciro di marzio when Don Pietro order to kill his daughter he would immediatly flip and send to jail don pietro,genny and the other savastano loyalists;or the ciro's wife would escaped with his daughter for save her from ciro;in gomorrah series the counterpart represented by law enforcement agencies is totally absent,in the Camorra many boys used to luxury, as soon as they end up in prison or worse in 41 bis, they can not stand up and decide to sell their friends.

Inthe ndrangheta are the mother that teach their children what is the omertà and prepare children to be ruthless leader and daughters to be mothers and pawns for alliances of the family.
Giuseppina Pesce of the Pesce ndrina "that in Calabria a Pesce is as a Riina or a Provenzano in Sicily" daughter of the boss and mother at 15 y for don't stay away from his sons flipped in 2011 and made start the operation All Clean.Now his brother swored to kill her and her mother said his daughter is died.

sicilian mafia is the same of ndrangheta, they teach the children what is omertà
sicilian mafia has more turncoats only because police focussed on it too much since the ending of 1980s
anyway it is not right ndrangheta turncoats can be counted on the finger of one hand, they are less than camorra and sicilian mafia, but a sizeable number too

In the NYC the Russians control:
- Coney Island
- Brighton Beach
- Parts of Sheepshead Bay.
Whereas the American mob has influence over all five boroughs in NYC. The mob also has guys in Sheepshead, and Coney Island to a lesser extent but they don't step on the Russians toes.

In these select pockets of Brooklyn that the Russians control, they are involved in:
- Bookmaking (cards and numbers - I don't know about sports betting)
- Loansharking
- Shakedowns of small businesses
- Drug dealing.
- Some high-ranking OC Russians have been involved in financial frauds and other swindles in the US but they don't really associate with the guys that control the other rackets i.e. bookmaking.

The mob, all over NYC and Jersey, control:
- All forms of gambling, including cards, sports betting and numbers.
- Forms of fraud such as personal scams, financial scams, insurance scams.
- Hijacking (the Russians may be involved in this too to a lesser extent).
- Drug dealing (all forms of drugs)
- Stock fraud (pump and dumps, wall street, etc.)
- Small business shakedowns (not as much as the Russian mob for many reasons).
- UNIONS! This is the main thing separating Russians and Italians. Once the Russians get entrenched in stuff like unions/politics, then talk to me about them being more powerful.

With the Russians, the guys at the top are in their 30s/40s whereas the guys at the top of the Mafia are often 60+. It is evident that there are a surging number of young, disenfranchised Russians in the U.S. that are resorting to organized crime. The Mafia meanwhile is a lot more established - there is still a sizable recruiting pool (in the suburbs, not so much the urban areas) but the bigwigs are guys that are established and older, and have been with the family for decades. There are a lot of powerful wiseguys that were straightened out before the Russian mob was even a thing, like Vinny Asaro, Andy Russo, Barney Bellomo.

Also, the Russians have a tendency to be a lot more violent than the Italians. That is because these guys often come from war-torn countries or rough backgrounds in the homeland whereas the Italian-Americans of today have kids, families, play golf, etc. For example in 2016 a group of Russian gangsters burnt down an entire apartment building in Sheepshead Bay because there was a rival card game held in the storefront. You wouldn't get that with the Italians nowadays. But I think the Russians are eventually going to realize that America isn't really the place for that sort of behavior since the feds are all over that.

If you have any questions about anything I said, please ask since I want to maintain a good reputation on this forum and not be viewed as a bullshitter/liar. This is my first post on this forum.

Nicky from Tampa.

Wow MEYER. Great post. Good information. I learned a lot.

Gomorra...good source material. Your mother sucked my cock last night.

More genius from Meyer. Thanks. This added a lot to the thread. You are a waste of sperm.

John Gotti's son Junior was half-Italian on his father's side.
I think as long as you have an Italian last name (and you don't look black, or Chinese or anything), you'll be fine - these guys don't do genealogy tests.

I did hear about one issue with Andrew Campos, a Gambino acting capo with a Greek-esque last name. The family looked into his history and found that he was actually Italian. Allegedly (don't know how true this is) the surname was originally Campo or something similar and his grandparents/great-grandparents changed it to prevent anti-Italian stigma.

But, what you are saying Meyer that the mob will not be Italian in 30 years is a puzzling argument because it's not like Italians are DYING OUT, they are just moving to the suburbs.

Also, don't see why you cited Gomorrah as your source. That, along with the Sopranos and the Godfather, etc., etc., are all make-believe or dramatizations. Strange thing to say.

I
I was asking furio
I know it's a show i said it myself but wanted to know how things are really like in the camorra

Ryan's been banned. Despite numerous warnings against flaming others he continued to do so. There is no room here for anyone who can't follow simple rules.

Funny thing is that i don't even know what i did to this guy...
I think it's all started from mrjustsayno post that i told him to keep posting and that he post great stuff and ryan hated him

Well, u wont have 2 read hisSHIT or worry about him or certain sarcastic newcamers anymore..as u can see,mods are all about the Big Brother ,eye in the sky dudes,keeping everyone proper as it should be..post on Meyer!

Thanks !

So i was wrong ? Or right ? Maybe not in 30 years but 50 ? Or even more ?
What i mean to ask is
So there are less italians these days ? (compare to the past) or more but they just don't join the mob like they used to ?

Probably more Italians
But the Italians are Americans first now.

LCN was born out Sicily
And Sicilys history and culture

LCN will always exist to a certain degree

It has for over 100 years

There will always be gamlbling, loan sharking and drugs and other black market.
LCN was origiannly created to be a Gov't in the lack of an actual Gov't

That was taken here to America when 1MM+ Sicialins came to America within a couple of years

That will never happen again.

The other thing about LCN back in th eary days in American Italians were treated very poorly and they had very few oppotrtunities to get up out of the poor Italian ghetto neighborhoods that existing during the great depression.

So really smart guys had very few choices and took the LCN route as they believed that was the only way out of poverty.

So you had the guys that could have been doctors, lawyers etc. joining LCN

Now for Italian americans there are so many ways out that joining LCN is not that attractive anymore.

Except in cases when fathers are passing down wealth and rackets to their sons.

Or something similar

Still might not be worth it because the sons will likey get pinched and go to jail

ohh i got it thanks a lot !

It was very common back in the for Italians to change their names to try to fit in

I.E. I have a friend 100% Italian last name back in Italy was Oliveri his grandfather chaged it to Oliver to give their family a better chance at the American dream
That's what they thought at the time anyway

I believe salemme was made by patriarca jr

Patriarca Junior??? I can't see that being true. Can Furio or anyone from Prov/Boston confirm this? Being from Prov I'd never heard that being the case.

just tellin ya what i read pal. read he was made after he got out of prison in the 80's, and it wasn't patriarca sr who inducted him. so it could only be patriarca jr., plus they were close.

saleemi testified infront of a senate commitee around 200? he told his whole story. he got out of state prison in feb 1987 he said he wanted to go strait but that was bullshit. ray yr called him down to providence in july 1987 he had a quick induction and that was it. he reported directly to ray jr which ruffled feathers in boston. im sure noo one gave a shit his mother was irish and bet noone thougth he would become the boss 4yrs later in 1991 after everyone was locked up. he was a hitman for the larry bione since the 60tys.

thanks pmac but i think we still need furio to confirm

i got a book its has his senate testmony in. he was in front of them to talk about dirty cops and fbi agents (john connely an crew) forgot book name its written by a former prosecutor friend of the family or some shit. salemmi said abunch of cheesy shit. he was the kings right hand man and such.

Was Frank Martines of philly mob fame a made guy? He was alledgedly Stanfa's underboss but his last name sounds Spanish or Mexican. Maybe his mother was Sicilian? Not much info out there on the guy.

The original rule of Cosa Nostra was that made members had to be 100% Sicilian. Naturally, I suppose, as it is the Sicilian Mafia. That being said, when the Moustached Petes consolidated power in New York during the early 20th century, masterminds like Lucky Luciano realized they could make far more money, gain far more power and influence, and really run a far more vast enterprise by doing business with non-Sicilians. Luciano was good friends with Meyer Lansky of course and many Jewish mobsters were close business associates with LCN members. Also during this time, the books were opened up to Italian-Americans, even if their ancestry was traced back to the mainland rather than Sicily. It was a controversial move. The mobsters back home didn't like this and some in the United States like Vito Genovese looked down upon working with men who were not Italian (although he himself was somewhat of an outsider in the organization as a Neapolitan). By mid-century, La Cosa Nostra members were instructed to "keep it within the family" and members married relatives of other members to ensure their blood was "pure." Associates could still be of other ethnicities (but always of European descent ) however nobody powerful would be a non-Italian. This became the norm through probably the seventies or the eighties when the mob was in disarray. At this point the rules were bent to the point where any man whose father was Italian could be initiated into the organization. Notable examples of this include the aforementioned "Cadillac Frank" Selemme whose mother was Irish, John Junior Gotti whose mother was a Russian Jew and Tommy Del whose mother was Polish. The former two were acting bosses of their respective families which would've been unheard of during the early days. They would've been whacked along with whoever sponsored and made them by the Sicilians the second their ancestry was discovered.

This rule remains more complicated to this day. It truly depends on the family. Some are stricter than others when it comes to "purity." These days its hard to find someone who is 100% Italian anyway. La Cosa Nostra could not realistically remain a force to be reckoned with had it not been for this rule change, however the most widely accepted agreement I've seen is that a person's father has to be Italian.

Now there have been a few examples of men being made who had zero Italian ancestry. John Veasey was made into the Philadelphia Crime Family by John Stanfa despite being a non-Italian. Vito Rizzuto was notoriously the most lenient in regards to ethnicity when he was the boss of Montreal. He has made members into his family who were not Italian at all. It is almost unfathamable, but the fact remains Juan Ramon Fernandez, a Spaniard, and Raynald Desjardins, a French Canadian, were made members of La Cosa Nostra and this caused quite a bit of friction between Rizzuto and the Sicilians. Fernandez was actually murdered in Italy.

So the question of whether or not someone has to be 100% Italian to be made is a complicated one, but the short answer is "no."

Yes, Joey Merlino and the Philly mob's recent exploits show they are certainly not small fries when it comes to what criminal exploits they pursue, huh?

You seem to be implying that the FBI etc. slack on the Russians, while ignoring the elephant in the room that is Hoover giving the mafia free rein and allowing them to become as powerful and omnipresent as they are today.

Steve Carell is actually of Italian descent. I think the family name was originally Carelli. Certain facial features should've given it away.

Guy Fieri's surname isn't actually Fieri, he changed it to honour his Grandfather.

I'd say there are a lot of mob guys we talk about who have a little Irish/WASP/Polish/Dutch etc. in them - but they're not going to shout it from the rooftops, are they?

People mix. They don't strictly fuck people who have the exact same family background as them; that hasn't been practical in over a hundred years.

in southern italy there are some spanish surnames, because south italy was under spain kingdom in the past
there are some people named martines, martinez, lopez etc.

Off the top of my head, prominent Italian footballers who had a parent who wasn't Italian include Christian Panucci (Czech), Riccardo Montolivo (German), and Pietro Vierchowod (Ukrainian); the great Paolo Maldini's family name was originally "Maldic", a Slovene name.

I think of other footballers like Sandro Cois and the great Gianluigi Buffon, and it reminds me of the time in Sopranos that Carmela accused her mother of being happy their name didn't end in a vowel.

I'm not talking about Philly or jersey my friend, I'm talking about Canadian guys, new York guys and Chicago. They are the real deal. If your trying to make a point of how you love Russians or something, get straight to it and stop beating around the bush.

John Veasey's mother was from Sicily.

Also, do we have proof that Desjardins and Fernandez were actually made? Fernandez could've just been a braggart and lying when he was in Sicily, saying he "sat at the right hand of God"... so did Lansky but he wasn't made.

Also, wasn't Michael Franzese adopted by Sonny as a baby? Do we know if he was actually of Italian blood?

That was a brilliant article.. Say what you want, but John Veasey is one tough son of a bitch!!

He looks reptilian. He's probably one of those lizard people that are related to the Bushes, the Rockefellers and the royal family.

How dare you speak so ill of such a sincere and honest Christian?!?